


Some sort of magic

by thursdayknight



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Billy Hargrove Has a Crush on Steve Harrington, Billy Hargrove Is Bad at Feelings, Billy Hargrove Needs Love, But they figure it out, Christmas, Disability, Fluff, Idiots in Love, Lots of it, Love Confessions, M/M, POV Billy Hargrove, Physical Disability, Post-Battle of Starcourt (Stranger Things), are you prepared to be punched in the face by softness?, because you're about to be, billy hargrove gets therapy, steve harrington is bad at feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:55:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28323456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thursdayknight/pseuds/thursdayknight
Summary: "I…" Steve says. "You love me?"In the gayest way possible, Billy thinks. Completely and with all of my heart. But instead, he says, "I do, yeah." Because, you know, even a weak, broken moron like him still has at least enough pride left not to say that.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 12
Kudos: 128





	Some sort of magic

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fluffmonsterc3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fluffmonsterc3/gifts).



> I wrote this fic for my friend Slash! I hope this makes up for not getting a christmas fic for the exchange. Merry Christmas!

"I know it's, uh…" Billy stammers. "Um…" 

He twists his hands together.

"Uh…" 

_Goddamnit, get it together!_

"Not much and I…" 

It's like ever since the whole dying-and-coming-back thing, since he's been learning to drop all his guards, lower his walls, cleanse himself of all that bullshit he'd used as a shield, ever since he's been in _therapy…_ it's like he's as weak and defenseless as a friggin' flower. Weak and defenseless and stupid.

His hands are shaking. 

Like a flower in a light breeze. Shaking. 

Like a moron. _Shaking._

He puts his hands behind his back. 

"It's small but I just…" He swallows and the words dry up. 

Steve looks at him, into him, _through_ him and sighs and something in Billy wants to ascribe the word "dreamily" to the motion but another part, a meaner part, the part that regularly and unrelentingly takes its fists to the crumbling remains of his self-esteem, wants to say the sound is more disappointed than it is dreamy. Because when has anything ever worked out like that for him? Really?

"Billy, whatever it is, I know I'll love it," Steve says before he tears at the bright red and poorly taped wrapping paper covering the gift that Billy wishes wasn't basically his heart and soul poured into…

It's stupid. It's so stupid. 

This is stupid. He should leave. This is _dumb._

He turns to do just that, to leave, but Steve stops him with a gentle hand on his arm. "Wait," he says softly. "Just…" 

Steve's hand drops from his arm. "Wait." He finishes removing the paper from Billy's gift and once he does he takes in a breath so sharp it sounds like it _hurts._

Like Billy has _hurt_ him. Like instantly he gets it, gets the gift, sees what it means, and it's _hurting_ him. 

They've been friends for over a year now and Billy thought… he just thought…

He thought...

This is stupid. This was _such_ a bad idea. 

And then, of course, it gets _worse._

Because then Steve starts to _cry._ Like full-on big, fat crocodile tears raining down his cheeks cry and Billy wants to sink into the floor and just disappear forever, to cease existing at all.

Because this was a mistake, this was…

He turns to leave again and again, Steve stops him with a gentle hand on his arm and an even gentler, "No, Billy, please, wait, I—"

He sobs. 

He fucking _sobs._

Billy looks up to see Steve shake his head. "I just—" he says. "No one's ever—" He lets out a long sigh and his fingers grip tightly to the edge of the canvas. "No one's ever made me a present before. And nothing this beautiful. _Thank you."_

 _Wait,_ Billy thinks. _Does he not…_

His hands slip to his sides. 

_Does he not…_

"I mean, I," Billy says, his mouth covering up for his brain's complete lack of thought. "I made it in art therapy." 

"You did?" Steve says, smiling. "That's so sweet." He again drops his hand from Billy's arm. He raises it to wipe at his face. His other hand is still gripping tight to the edge of the canvas.

And this is when Billy's mouth runs away from his brain entirely. "They told us to paint what we love most." 

And now it's not just Billy's hands that are shaking but Billy's _everything._ He's been degraded from a flower to a _leaf._ He doesn't even have _roots_ anymore. He doesn't know how he's still _standing._

And Steve says nothing for almost long enough for Billy to fly apart, to separate into his basic atoms and dissolve into nothingness right there on the spot. 

"But you painted _me,"_ Steve says, still not getting it.

And all Billy can come up with to say is, "Yeah, I did." Because he did. In a room full of people, when told to paint what he loves most, he exposed himself by painting _another man._ Not that anyone there had caught on to what he'd meant, of course. They'd all just assumed he'd painted his best friend and left it at that. Because that's just what straight people _do_ when coming across homosexuality in the wild, more often than not. They ignore it and then hope it'll go away.

"I…" Steve says. "You love me?" 

_In the gayest way possible,_ Billy thinks. _Completely and with all of my heart._ But instead, he says, "I do, yeah." Because, you know, even a weak, broken _moron_ like him still has at least enough pride left not to say _that._

_"I… You love me?"_ Steve says again, this time with more intensity and feeling, though it's a feeling Billy can't at all decipher, so he just nods in response, even though Steve is staring down at the painting of him that looks like a nine-year-old did it so heavily that there's almost no chance he can actually _see Billy doing it._

"I…" Steve starts again and Billy starts to feel the urge to scream or worse to lash out. To get violent. To say it was all a joke, he doesn't love him, he…

"I love you, too," Steve says. "I love you, too." He doesn't look up, but Billy feels the tiniest flickering flame of hope licking at him, warming his skin, his body, his soul. 

But…

But...

He has to know for sure. 

"You mean like…" he starts out but can't finish. All these wounds he's still got, both physical and mental, all this damage… he's sure it will eat him alive if he finishes that question and the answer turns out to be no. No, no, not really. No, not like that. I meant I love you as a friend. Just a friend.

He can't deal with that. He can't take it.

He starts to feel like he's shaking apart again, he starts to—

"I mean it like I think you mean it, yeah," Steve says. He takes a few tiny, stumbling steps forward, towards Billy, but he still doesn't look up, eyes still locked on the painting like they're trapped there, like the painting is casting some sort of spell on him, like the painting is some sort of magic. 

"I mean it like…" Billy takes a deep breath and drags the shambles of his old self out of the deep, dark closet at the back of his mind just long enough to suck the remnants of his old courage, his old brash and brazen nature out of it before slowly and carefully putting it back where it belongs. "I mean it like I'm in love with you," he says. 

And finally, Steve looks up at him, eyes tear-bright and shining, and he says, "Good. Because I'm in love with you, too." And he says it so proudly, so loudly and so certain that it disintegrates the mean part of Billy's brain. He can practically feel its fists exploding into sparks, sparks that settle smoothly and happily throughout his body, dusting over him like glitter. He feels a warm and soft kind of happiness he hasn't felt since long before Starcourt, a kind of happiness he hasn't felt since… probably his childhood, since his days on the beach with his mother.

He smiles. 

He knows that mean part, even disintegrated as it presently is, will put itself back together given enough time. He knows this one day, this one moment, hasn't silenced it forever. He knows his fight against his coarser, worst, and most ingrained bad instincts isn't magically and finally over. 

But it's silenced for now. It's over for today. 

And for now, that is enough. 

"Can I…?" He waves at the space between them awkwardly, because while he's excavated his old courage from out of the depths, he apparently left behind all of his cool.

Still, Steve nods at him enthusiastically and Billy closes the distance between them as fast as his mangled legs will let him and he wraps his arms around Steve, holds him tight. He kisses him deeply and slowly, savoring every second and knowing, now more than ever, that if this is what he has to work for, this is what he has to look forward to, that fight? That fight against the mean part of himself? It's worth it. Becoming a better person is worth it. 

And, of course, it's not just for Steve. It's for himself. It's for Max. It's for El and all the other little nerds that have slowly grown on him by their sheer and unrelenting presence in Steve's life and thus in his own. It's for Susan and for Joyce and for Claudia, the women who have decided he is theirs and he is to be cared for and loved and protected. 

But it's also for Steve.

So he can be worthy of the kind of love Steve is pouring into him just by means of this kiss. The kind of love Steve has been pouring into him ever since the day he came by the hospital and decided not to leave, even before Billy was awake. Even before it seemed like he would ever be awake again. 

Billy wraps his hands into Steve's hair and pulls him closer, closer, closer. There will never be a close enough when it comes to this, to Steve, but damned if he's not going to try. 

Steve moans in response and Billy hears the sound of something—probably the painting—hit the floor before both of Steve's hands are gripping Billy's shoulders and Steve is pressing into him so tight and so completely that Billy can feel Steve's heart thudding wildly against his own ribs, like Steve's heart is inside his own chest. 

He figures this is only fair. 

His own heart, actively, physically battered and bruised as it is, has been living in Steve's chest for a really, really long time. Probably ever since that first day Steve came and sat down by Billy's hospital bed and held his hand and told him it would all be okay, it would all be alright, he would make it through this. He was strong enough to survive, so he would. And Steve would help. He would be there. Every day. 

It's a hell of a first memory to have, after something like what Billy went through. The boy he'd had a crush on since the day he'd arrived in this town, sitting by his bedside and pouring more kindness and love into him than he'd ever known, even from his mother. 

And now?

With Steve's soft moans resonating in his ears, with the way all the other scents in the room have disappeared—the smell of the burnt sugar cookies Steve had attempted to make, the overpowering cinnamon stench of Steve's Mom's _ugly_ Christmas wreaths, the soft scent of pine from the tree—they're all swallowed whole by the scent of Steve's mouth-watering shampoo, and it's…

Well, Billy can't say something like it was all worth it, much as he wants to. No matter how much of a romantic it turns out he is, he can't say everything he's been through has been worth it to get here, to get to this moment, he can't. His legs are a mess, he's still re-learning to walk, he's covered in scars, he's on fifteen different medications, the names of which he'll probably never remember and each with their own side-effects and problems. Most of his organs don't work right and one of his kidneys was so damaged it had to be removed entirely.

So this, no matter how great it might be, this doesn't wipe all that away. Not even in the moment. Not even a little bit, not even at all.

But it does help.

It does help to know that his heart, as damaged and malfunctional as it is, is still good, is still worth loving. 

That _he_ is still worth loving. 

Especially by someone as kind and as caring and as wonderful as Steve is. 

Billy breaks the kiss to tell him as much. "I love you, so much, you're so…" He's thought and he's thought and he's _thought_ about it but the words won't move to his lips. They're trapped in his brain. "Wonderful," he settles on, knowing it's not enough but also knowing he can find the rest of the words later. 

They'll have the rest of their lives for him to find the words he needs to tell Steve just how _special,_ just how _important_ he is. He knows that, even now, with just this one kiss, he _knows_ it like he knows his own _name._

Steve smiles at him, big and bright and wild and he says, "So are you," before diving into kissing him again. 

And it isn't worth it. Isn't worth everything. It doesn't make up for everything. But it does make it better. 

Loving Steve makes it better. 

And that's enough. 


End file.
